EIFF 2013: Jurassic Park 3D Review

Chances are that you’ve already seen Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park. First released in 1993, where it broke box office records, won just about every technical award going, and spawned two (soon to be three?) sequels, the film was restored and re-released only last year where it once again drew out and delighted audiences in droves.

The story, as ever, sees paleontologist Allan Grant (Sam Neill) and paleobotanist Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern) invited to accompany John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) out to an island he owns off the coast of Costa Rica. There they join lawyer Donald Gennaro (Martin Ferrero) and mathematician Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), in addition to John’s grandchildren Tim (Joseph Mazzello) and Lex (Ariana Richards), on a tour of Jurassic Park, where scientists have actually managed to clone dinosaurs. When a tropical storm threatens the island, however, a disgruntled employee seizes the chance to sabotage its systems, leaving the billion-dollar attractions to roam free.

While the story may be exactly the same, however — there is no George Lucas-level tinkering here — the movie feels fresh and exciting. You can never see a film again for the first time, but in IMAX 3D there is such size and depth to the picture that you have certainly never seen it quite like this before. As may be attested by the audience members still laughing and recoiling at some of the film’s most memorable scenes, the 20-year-old blockbuster is still entertaining, enchanting and scaring people in a cinema otherwise playing Man Of Steel and Despicable Me 2.

It really is astonishing just how well the film holds up in 2013; the dinosaurs — a combination of CGI, puppetry and animatronics — are as big and breath-taking as ever. But as trivia-hounds will no doubt know, this accounts for only 15 minutes of Jurassic Park’s 127 minute running-time. It’s a very character-driven movie, and part of what makes the film so successful is Spielberg’s insistence that the dinosaurs may overrun the park, but never the film. Every character has something to do, and they are the focus of ever scene.

But the praise doesn’t end with Stan Winston’s effects and Steven Spielberg’s direction; Jurassic Park simply wouldn’t be Jurassic Park without John Williams’ sweeping score. With the visuals pushed as far as they can conceivably go, it would be easy to overlook the audio, but such is Williams’ mastery that such oversight just isn’t possible. The film holds up on every watch, but it is only when you see it in a cinema that you can fully appreciate the film’s power.

Jurassic Park is a masterpiece — it always has been and it always will be. With Jurassic Park IMAX 3D you have the opportunity to watch it as if for the first time, with the scale and stereoscopy rendering Allan Grant and Ellie Sattler as impressive as their first encounter with a grazing Brachiosaurus, while the Tyrannosaurus — always the star attraction — just about fills the room each time it appears. No expense has been spared.